Connecting London and The Hague Through Stories

A prerecorded presentation, a live conversation, and a lesson in how communication can cross distance without losing the human exchange.

While I was in London for a speaking engagement at SOAS University of London, another conversation was unfolding across the North Sea.

The Filipino Correspondent Network had invited me to speak at its Global Summit in The Hague. The timing created an unusual challenge. I could not be physically present in the Netherlands, but I still wanted to contribute meaningfully to the room.

I recorded an hour-long presentation in advance. Participants gathered in The Hague watched it together, and I later joined them virtually from London for the question-and-answer session.

In a way, the format reflected the very subject of the talk: communication across contexts.

Stories are never framed in a vacuum

My presentation explored how cultural dimensions can offer another lens for thinking about newswriting and news framing.

One of the ideas I discussed was the collectivist orientation often associated with Filipino society. In more individualistic contexts, a story may be framed strongly around personal agency, individual responsibility, or individual achievement. In more collectivist settings, audiences may also pay close attention to relationships, family, community, shared identity, and the consequences of an event for the wider group.

This does not mean every Filipino story must be framed collectively, or that all Filipino audiences interpret stories in the same way. Cultural dimensions are not formulas, and they should never be used to reduce people to labels. They are lenses that can help journalists examine the assumptions beneath the stories they tell.

Cultural dimensions are not formulas. They are lenses that help journalists ask better questions.

Newswriting through culture

• Who is placed at the center of the story?
• Is the individual presented mainly as an independent actor, or as someone situated within relationships and communities?
• Whose welfare matters in the framing of the issue?
• What responsibilities do people have toward one another?

These questions can shape not only what journalists report, but also how audiences interpret meaning.

Rules, relationships, and context

I also introduced the cultural dimension of universalism and particularism. A more universalist orientation tends to emphasize consistent rules, standards, and principles. A more particularist orientation gives greater weight to relationships, circumstances, and the specific context surrounding a situation.

For journalists, this creates an important area for reflection. When people respond differently to the same rule, is the story mainly about inconsistency? Or are relationships and circumstances part of how the people involved understand what is fair and appropriate?

Cultural intelligence does not supply a formula for deciding which interpretation is correct. What it can do is help journalists recognize that their own assumptions about fairness, responsibility, relationships, and social obligation may shape the way a story is framed.

This becomes especially relevant for journalists reporting on Filipino communities across countries. The people in their stories may be navigating several cultural contexts at once: the culture of the Philippines, the culture of the country where they now live, and the cultures of the institutions and communities they encounter every day.

A conversation across borders

The unusual format of the engagement became one of the things I appreciated most about it. My presentation traveled ahead of me to The Hague. Participants watched the recorded talk together in the room. I then joined them live from London for the discussion that followed.

Technology did not replace the human exchange. It made a different kind of exchange possible.

Connecting two rooms across the North Sea

The experience reminded me that culturally intelligent communication is not limited to film, television, or entertainment. It also matters in journalism, where framing choices influence how people understand events, communities, and one another.

For news organizations serving communities across borders, the challenge is not simply to move information from one place to another. It is also to understand the cultural contexts through which that information will be interpreted.

My thanks to the Filipino Correspondent Network team for inviting me into the conversation and for finding a way to connect London and The Hague through stories.

Engagement details

Editorial disclosure: This article was developed from Ned Legaspi’s professional experience and revised for publication with AI-assisted editing. The ideas, interpretations, experiences, and final approval are the author’s.